The Yoma
by QQQQQ
Summary: In Clare's first mission, she confronts a singular Yoma at a village.
1. Chapter 1

**The Yoma –** by QQQQQ

* * *

**SCENE 1 **- Clare

Her hardened boots clatter on the dirt path. Clare walks the pathway to the village of Norslof – a medium village with the backdrop of a lush forest by its side. She slowly breathes in the chill air of the muted morning, when the sun has risen from the horizons.

The large, inhuman sword tucked beneath her cloak on her back is a burden that adds a quivering quality on each of her footsteps. When Clare hefts the cold sword with its tip extending out, the weapon seems so out of place on her slightly hands; it is seemingly built for the hands of a marble god. She wonders if she could ever get used to this weight.

Clare adjusts the sheath on her back.

Through and through, every fibre of her person feels nervous anticipation, and the rush of energy this brings. Her gut tightens, queasy. The air chills her cheeks and hands. The trees of pine cast looming shadows on the path, with their gnarly roots alongst the soil.

Her steps clatter on, bringing her closer to Norslof. From what Rubel had said, it is a mundane village, inhabited by commoners and tradesmen, except one. This one sees the commoners and tradesmen as mere living flesh, no more food alive or slaughtered. This one finds his fellow man the warmest place to hide.

This is why the Organization sends for her there, for without her and her kind, the Yoma thrives on its lifestyle of destruction.

Clare lays her eyes on the village for the first time. Foreboding fills her mind. Amongst the green trees the group of grey and brown housing are clustered together. The spindly tall points of one building overshadows the rest in grandiosity. _There it is. _Surveying what she first sees, the welcoming area is made sour of knowing a monster thrives there.

She stops. She breathes the cold air in.. and

out..

in..

and

out..

The air is soothing ice in her lungs.

Clare starts on her way towards the village.

/...

Now at the village, she feels the stares of each and every person's eyes. They look on her, cold and alienating stares. The hushed whispers spread amongst them – whispers of accounts terrifying on her kind.

Clare glances back too, on each and every one of them. Each one she gazes to freeze up in superstitious fear. One is the Yoma.

"..is a Claymore.."

"Careful now.. don't.. don't make her mad.."

"..silver-eyed witch.."

She grimaces.

Along the way, Clare notices a bunch of children, made to hide behind the grown-ups for their safety. They gaze on her, not in fear - but in bewilderment, curiosity, and wonderment of her figure. She holds back the urge to give a reassuring smile to them.

Two of them scuttle off, a boy and a girl. They weave their way through the focused crowd and come to get a better view of her alongside a towering black statue. It is an angel, lifting up a dying one to peace.

Her fingers stretch out, ready to draw should it strike now.

Ahead, a rackety, bearded man amongst the crowd comes to her in a rush. "You must be the one they sent us?"

"Yes."

"C'om- come along now- come along now with me," he goes. He notions for her to follow, as nervous as the others in his demeanour.

/...

In the midst of the open square where vendors have set, is a cathedral. Its largeness hails it as a landmark of the village, with its spires pointed up high to the grey sky.

There the man leads her.

Clare hears the scuttling of little feet behind her as the man opens the doors for her. Inside leads to an grand open space of worship and imparting.

They both enter.

/

Her footsteps clack on the stone floor, making a ghast echo through the place. Frescos of mythology and history decorate the spaces between the glazed windows high up beyond reach. Wooden seats are spread upon the open floor between Clare and the other end of the place.

On the other end of place, in a solid seat, lies a man, elderly and a near invalid, limp on the throne in a conceited costume. He is struggling to breathe. Beside him is another man with a curled beard and imposing eyebrows, who whispers in the elderly man's ear.

Upon hearing what the vizier has to say, the elderly man takes in a shocking gasp, looking forward with limited vision to the oncoming Clare.

The vizier takes the liberty to do the acquaintances on behalf.

"Greetings to you, miss," he goes.

"Hello."

"You are a fine miss indeed for the Organization to have sent you here," the vizier goes. "What would be your name, if you have any?"

Clare recalls the detached curtness so conditioned on her, but finally allows herself to be open.

"My name is Clare."

"Ahh," he goes. "My name is Ser Rodrik, of the humbled village Norslof you see here before you. As you can well imagine, we have been **plagued **by this beastly Yoma. It has mauled and killed fifteen of our people over the past week, and breathes amongst us even now, now, very now. But I presume you already know this."

Rodrik notions to the man who leads Clare. From coming over, Rodrik pulls a leather sack from the man, and walks slowly over to her, arm extended. The payment.

But Clare does not accept the pay. Rubel does.

"Here inside, is your payment," Rodrik goes. "I hope it is-"

"The money," Clare goes, "is for the man in black who shall come in my stead when I have finished."

A beat.

"But should I fail and die," Clare goes, "you do not have to pay."

The leather bag shakes around in Rodrik's quivering hand, before he lowers it. The warmth drains out of his thinly face. "Oh."


	2. Chapter 2

**SCENE 2 –** The Cathedral of St. Hélène

The yoki is the resulting energy from the essence of the Yoma, an erring flow of abstract water. From surgical implantation, yoki may be drawn and harnessed at the bearer's pleasure. Many wondrous, supernatural abilities are allowed from the use of the yoki to augment the self; some use the yoki to fight and unleash violence, while others use yoki to endure, to survive on.

But this gift doth come with caution.

Yoki remains in the daemonic domain, and while it may provide as a tool, an instrument, it brings along the corruption inherent in the daemonic energies. As the bearer strives to strain in its usage, the yoki strives to make the bearer alike its Yoma symbiont in body and eventually soul. Although useful the alterations may be, its corrupting effects transform faster than the bearer would like that to be, and in the end, just will bring a sorrow stream.

To the naked eye, a Yoma in imitation holds itself true in nigh-every analysis. A bearer of the Yoma essence may attune their yoki to that of the Yoma, and thus find and confront it through feeling.

This is why the Organization sends for her here, for without her and her kind, the Yoma thrives on its lifestyle of destruction.

But Clare has not yet mastered this aspect of yoki manipulation, as many of her kind did. While they could freely attune to the presence of Yoma from afar, Clare is limited to yoki perception through intimate contact.

"When did the attacks first start?" she asks.

Rodnik ponders.

"A week.. a bit before a week methinks," he goes.

"Have any one of the villagers departed or arrived back then?" Clare asks.

"How should I know?" he goes. "What each person goes abound in their lives is their business, and their business alone. Anyway the attacks have been going on since.. up to last night with an entire family massacred. I've heard of these.. **things **and the atrocities they've done inflicted on places in my years, but to know it's here, breathing down our necks at any moment is just.. just.."

_In nightmares a lifetime away, she cried. Those were the years when happiness died and the sadness came to lie. _

_It took away Mama.. and Papa.. and made her watch it savour every single bite on their pulverized bodies. She was screaming, through and through, and no one would help._

_It left her just barely alive as its slave and toy. It would come up with terrifyingly ways of hurting her, every night in solitude, and in the mornings it dressed her outside wounds and towed her along from town to town, village to village, taking on the facsimile of its victims of late. When she tried to run away from it for many a time, it fulfilled its promises her nights would be much more unbearable. _

_Every night she cried._

_Eventually, the tears wouldn't come anymore, and she had lost herself in the madness. Her outside wounds grew so coarse that it stopped bothering to dress up her pain. People noticed. Their talks of her grisly look was scornful, alienating - shunning. From place to place the talks made the days the stinging salt on open wounds._

_It had seemed she would never see or feel the light of day ever again._

_Until.._

_There was Teresa. Teresa came down, like an angel and made it and others like it.. die. She was wearing the light armour of the Organization, and came by, saved her. She who smiled softly, forever – she who welcomed, forever._

_She saw the goodness and the same pain in Teresa's eyes, and yet when she approached her – Teresa rejected her. But still she followed her, saw her palely day and night, and still addressed her in hope. She followed Teresa as her legs buckled in from utter exhaustion. She followed her until hunger and thirstiness came upon her as second thought.. her eyes staring ahead forever at the elusive Teresa._

_And Teresa looked back and saw the wonderment in her eyes, and came to know her sadness, and opened her heart once more. Teresa gave her a new name for her own name was long forgotten – Clare. Together they went, hand in hand, and they were happy. It was the everlasting moment Clare had been waiting for, and the moment had passed once more, for Teresa was slain by one who learned the sorrow streams of the yoki._

___And every day, for the six years hence, she thought always of two things. The first is the happiness, memories of Mama, Papa.. and Teresa. Whether she could resolve to save them in her dreams if not in the past. The second is what she would do to the monster who took them away, if she ever found her again._

/

Sadness rouses in her eyes, but she wills it down and away, burying the poignant memories along so. For a moment, she averts her gaze from Rodrik and the others, so they would not see the emotional crack in the warrior. She looks to the frescos of the walls, seeing the painted on men and women dueling with monsters of legend and myth, forever frozen in their pose.

Clare takes a breath in.

"Do you have a registry of the residents?" she asks.

"We do.. it's in the civic chambers," Rodrik goes.

A beat.

"How many people reside in Norslof?" Clare goes.

"Around 500 or so," Rodrik goes.

"And how many would this cathedral hold?"

"The Cathedral of St. Hélène holds.. 700 in the main chamber," Rodrik goes. "Why?"

Before Clare continues on with her plan, she looks to the thinly Rodrik with suspicion, along with the elderly man and the bearded man who watches along from the side.

"Would you hold still?" Clare goes.

"Wh-"

With a hand, Clare reaches to Rodrik's temple, her other hand eased to draw her sword. Her hand is devoid of the humanly warmth, and shocks him to the touch as he lets out a slight whimper, absolutely frozen to the spot he stands. Other than his warm skin, there is no feeling of the Yoma within him.

She removers her touching hand, then turns to the bearded, silent man. Rodrik seems to almost collapse, with shaking breaths. The bearded man points to himself as she comes to approach him, as if to say a wordless 'me?'. Clare goes to touch his temple, where her icy touch making him shiver and shake and sputter out sour breathes along her face. Her silver irises meet with his frightened, amber eyes. To the man, she is the judge gazing into him and his sins.

_Not him.._

And lastly, Clare turns to the elderly man slump on the opulent stone throne. He breathes in efforts of holding on to dear life. He turns to her, seeing her undefined form approach.

"Wha-"

Clare touches his temple. The elderly man is just that, an elderly man, no more harm than any other. His eyes are nearly filled with the blind whiteness. She gives him a reassuring pat on the shoulder.

"Is there anyone else in the cathedral?" Clare asks.

"There are, I believe, six of the servants of St. Hélène here now," Rodrik goes.

/...

After her personal outlook upon the cloaked servants, relief pours through Clare's feelings – a false relief. Though she may be free to talk easily now, the Yoma still haunts unnoticed amongst the people, unfortunately. The whispering of the moving air is magnified many-fold in the atmosphere of the open chamber.

"..I need** everyone **to gather inside," Clare goes.

"Everyone is already-" Rodrik goes.

"Every soul from the village?" a servant goes.

"One is the Yoma."

"That's.." Rodrik goes.

Little scuttling footsteps seem to come from all round.

"Who goes there?!" the vizier goes. "**Is it you, the demi-devil who torments us so!?**_**"**_ He draws his longsword. The bearded man draws his own blade too – a short dirk in answer, unsure.

Some of the servants huddle close by the imposing vizier, while the others decide to seek shelter with Clare. The old man is rasping, picking up on the others' fears as he struggles around.

"**Come out here! Come on out here!**" Rodrik goes. "**You pay for your bloodshed! I swear it!**"

The monsters of the frescos have their empty eyes set on the shivering Ser Rodrik. There is something breathing here that did not love him.


	3. Chapter 3

**SCENE 3 –** The Children of Men

The scuttling goes on throughout the large cathedral chamber. The whispers of the air answer Ser Rodrik's jests for a battle. Clare inches her fingers, being prepared to draw. She hears the frightened breaths and whimpering of the cathedral's servants, tempting her on to breathe and fear as they do.

Ser Rodrik's longsword trembles in his hands. While brought up to fare against many situations that need a strong heart, he could almost taste the stink of the Yoma upon him, its breaths tinging the hairs of his neck. Many a time he heard the stories about the Yoma from neighbouring places, and nearly all of them wind up with even the bravest of men turned into torn, bite-ridden bodies. He isn't sure whether it is that thought that scares him so, or this protector here who stands here without her weapon drawn, calm.

Her heart is beginning to beat fast and hard inside her. The sword on her back seems to drop ever so downward..

_No._

Instead, Clare listens on to where the scuttling noises come from. For now, it is just the moving air of the place that brushes by her ears and hair.. and faint whispers of voices, from high up all over. Young voices – the whispers of children_._

Clare focuses intently on the voices.

"..they're going to.."

"..heard us.."

"..scared.."

Some sobs.

She recalls their wondering faces amongst the cold stares of the villagers, and she remembers to relax. Looking up, she sees alongside the glazed windows and beaming outside light, the balconies leading to a darkness unknown.

Ser Rodrik looks on to Clare, eyes widening.

"It is the children."

"Children?! **Children? **Our children?" Ser Rodrik goes. He does not hear so far as Clare does. "You are truly daft.. our children, in here!? They should be tending in their homes.. My children.. That Yoma is out there! It breathes our air, lives our lives, likens our trust and eats our flesh – that's what it does. **That's all it does! ** It'll reach down their throats, **and tear their little beating hearts out**! How could you say that.." He rasps out in breaths, on the verge of crying out. His eyes glimmer with fear, red and wet with worrying tears. If it took his children away..

The hooded servants have their heads bowed down in silent prayer to their patron saint. The bearded man alongside dreads the day when his own daughter would be too, taken away into an unforgivable fate, and has his head down too.

_It will do worse. _

Then a young face protrudes from up above from a balcony, tear-laden, who looks down to the others, and to Clare. Her tear-laden eyes cry out, for she begins to truly grasp the horrors of the menace her father has just barely let her on about.

"Daddy..?"

Ser Rodrik hears her gentle, familiar voice.

"Emilia?" He turns to where his daughter's voice calls from – up there on high. Her slightly form stands atop the cathedral balcony. "**Emilia!**" He sheaths his longsword, walking over there. "Ohh.. ohhh.. thank God, you're.. alive.. alive- **What in the blazes are you doing outside home!?**" His words thunder.

"Daddy.." Emilia meekly goes, "I'm.." Her word transitions to choking gasps. "I'm.. so sorry.. I just.. I wanted to.. want- wanted to have a look upon.."

And although her last words remain unsaid, Ser Rodrik and the others still understand. Her words somewhat flatter Clare. It's reminiscent of Clare herself as a young girl, when she would look to Teresa with the same fascination and lull.

Another girl joins by Emilia's side, who holds Emilia's hand in comfort. "Same for me," she goes. Then a boy from the darkness, and so on, until the whole band of the children come to stand by Emilia's side, proud and confident they are.

Clare looks on to them, but with caution; either one could hold host to the masquerading monster, sadly. Rodrik looks to Clare and sees her worry. He grasps the unfortunate implication, and looks back upon the children on the balcony with gloom.

A beat.

"Emilia.. all.." Rodrik goes. "I want you to come down here, and meet with Clare."

Eagerly, they do – they disappear away from the balcony, footsteps within the walls, and come running out through the doorway from another inner chamber.

"Clare here.. shall be having a little look upon each one of you," Rodrik goes. "It won't take long."

He sighs.

"What will you do?" a boy asks. His voice cracks on, on the verge of becoming a man.

A beat.

"I will check you," Clare goes.

At first, they blink – thinking it must be a ploy by the grown-ups, however unusual, to have them checked for the usual illnesses. How strange is it, to have this unearthly woman come all the way so she could play doctor with them. She is the one to fight away the Yoma, the beast who thrives in the form of men and

Slowly and surely, they understand. With new looks of suspicion replacing once-familiarity of each other, the children go out and away from each other, shaken and utterly afraid of the terrifying thought.

"No- no!" Ser Rodrik goes. "**No. STOP!**"

His command thunders through the open chamber, and through the hearts of the children. They stop, dead still. He knows they know, and it pains him to bear seeing the close friends turn to such savage fear like this.

"You shall stand orderly, and stand.. **safe away** from each other," Rodrik goes. "Up along the walls here. **Hup**!"

And they do.

"Not to worry.." the bearded man goes. "Not to worry.. I tell you. There are 500 of us here, and this Yoma thing is but one. It holds unlikely that either one of you **are **the beast in secret. You have watched over each other have you not? Over the times, you have bonded so close with one another. Do not let this thought tear your friendships apart to madness, I beg you!" He looks on to his daughter, standing at the end of the line of other frightened children.

They shiver on.

Clare walks over to start with the first child of this line, a young boy, not past a decade. The others look onto her with increasing intensity. His brown eyes so supple in youth, so frightened. Kneeling down to his height, she reaches her hand out to the boy's temple, and feels him.

The boy squirms, shocked by her icy touch. "It's cold!"

Everyone watches on.

And once that was that, Clare gives the boy a tender kiss on the forehead, and her reassuring smile for good measure.

On and on. Dread and tension are two scents of Chaos that saturates the air so. As Clare continues on, the hooded servants come to take the looked-at children by their side, and give great thankful blessings of St. Hélène to each.

Then it comes to a boy of auburn hair and blue eyes in the middle. Ser Rodrik pours sweat, nearing tears. His son Bran has now come to be judged. His moist-laden fingers are cocked, hesitantly ready for his longsword.

Bran closes his eyes as Clare lays out a touch to his temple. Rodrik holds in air.

Then Clare gives him a kiss like on the others, and lets him go to the group of watched children.

Next is Emilia, who pants heavily.

She checks her. She lets her go free.

Ser Rodrik breaks down into sobs; overjoyed that his two loves breathe well. He runs over to Bran and Emilia – giving them both a very appreciative hug and kisses like never before. It incenses the other children, still awaiting for Clare.

Clare moves on.

"Hello.." the young boy timidly goes. A slight uncanny feeling sparks within her mind as she goes to approach him, making her shiver as if the air has frozen.

"Hello," Clare goes, kneeling down. The boy noticeably is more frightened than all the others. She reaches out for his temple.

"Are you ever- afraid?" he asks her. Her cold fingers feel his warm skin.

He is who he is.

Clare takes away her touch. She pauses for a moment – the thought never occurred to her. She searches her feelings deep down, into her memories..

"It's okay to be afraid."

A beat.

The boy begins to stutter out something – but his words don't seem to come out. "I'm.. I.. I.. bad.. dreams.." he goes, quivering. "I'm afraid.. if you could.. could you.. make them go away."

A beat.

"What do you dream?" Clare asks of the boy.

The others watch on.

The boy's breathing becomes increasingly panicky; his mouth stutters, making attempts to form words. No words will come.

So Clare gives him grace; she leans forward to give a pecking kiss on his forehead – her warm breath her gift to him. "There."

And he smiles.

On and on Clare goes to check.

And lastly, she comes to a girl with curling blond hair that droops down her shoulders. The girl is trembling, scared for her life. There was nothing wrong with the rest of her friends, but that would only mean the odds have increased against her. She has a bad feeling the Yoma is festering inside her body as the stories were told. What happens if the silver-eyed woman felt something wrong within her? Her heart is pounding so ravagely inside her.. maybe it is the **Yoma's **heart that is pounding inside her.. and maybe it is that the Yoma has somehow taken over without her knowing it.

"I don't wanna be the Yoma.."

The bearded man cannot take any more of this; he just **snaps. **He rushes over, and goes to kneel by the girl's side – hugging and clutching onto her with all his might.

Something within Clare cracks upon this sight. But she kneels down anyway in front of the girl and the bearded man. Daughter and father.

"Dany.. everything's going to be all right." He locks eyes with her – he believes it is her with all his heart. The man turns to Clare.

A beat.

He nods to Clare.

"Everything's going.."

Clare reaches out to Dany's temple.

"..to be.."

Dany shivers to the cold touch. The moisture drips down the bearded man's brow, as he shuts his eyes, dreading Clare's verdict. He feels his pounding heart against his own chest, and Dany's delicate heartbeats on his – seeing moments with Dany flash by before his mind.

A beat.

And through the blankness of shut eyelids, he feels Clare giving him a tap. He opens them, to find Dany, sweet Dany, alive in his arms.

"She is all right," Clare goes.

The man's face melts into a sigh. He cradles Dany in his arms; father and daughter hold each other tight in loving embrace. He hugs her, and a great sob wells up deep inside, from a spring he had thought long dry. He hugs her fiercely as the sobs come.

Clare rises, and then turns to Ser Rodrik and the servants.

"Summon everyone."


	4. Chapter 4

**SCENE 4 – **Search / The Fettered

With the help of the hooded servants, St. Hélène's bells shout out to Norslof in full, clanging glory, arousing everyone's attention. The Yoma and people stop and freeze on their tasks upon hearing the cacophony of loud ringing, and know that a summoning is in order.

The main hall has been cleared of its seats, leaving the stone, dusty ground bare. Should Clare comes upon the Yoma, she'll have plenty of room to manoeuvre.

Under the watchful eye of a servant, the gang of children rest in one of the chapels. In each of their hearts, they eagerly await the inevitable moment when Clare would find the Yoma. It is only a question of how long a time must pass, touching one of 500, one by one, before she comes to kill it in a fantastic spectacle.

They pour in through the grandiose gates, shepherded in with help from the watch. As they start filling the main body of the cathedral, the air begins to fill with their sour, humid sweat and chatter. Ser Rodrik is standing by checking off the names of each who enter in with the village registry at hand. Clare idly looms at the very back, looking on each face, lit by dampened light. Some faces look back to her only a moment, out of curious suspicion. Some avoid looking back at her entirely.

To Clare, their stares unnerve.

Finally, the main hall is saturated with presence where it once had been empty. People - women, men and children nervously crowd the floors, standing, focusing on the back area where the village leader sits, and Ser Rodrik and Clare stand.

By now, everyone should be in here already, for the bells have stopped tolling. But the held registry in Rodrik's hands says otherwise, leaving three souls yet unaccounted for:  
- Tyrion, a solitary man who prefers his time brooding in his home,  
- Yohn, the jolly plump cook,  
- and finally Jean, the weaponsmith.

Rodrik's hands flutter as he lets his hand drop down to his side. He hurriedly walks over to the head watch by the side, Ser Tomas, in his sparse iron armour and pike.

"Tomas?" Rodrik goes. The vizier shows him the registry of people in hand. "Tyrion, Yohn and Jean are missing."

A nod from Rodrik says the implication.

"Do you want me to send a search for them?" Tomas asks, as he ponders a way to do the search with enough men to confront the Yoma, while leaving enough back at the cathedral.

A beat.

"Send a party of four bravehearts," Rodrik goes. "Instruct them.. that if they come upon the Yoma.. or it come over them, they do **not **fight. It would be their end. Just.. they shall flee back, as fast as their legs are able and call out to the cathedral for us to hear. Should they manage to return here, they knock hard on these **locked **doors. Understood?"

A long beat.

"Right away Ser." The head guard heads off to-

"Wait," Rodrik goes. "Before that, you have Clare there evaluate you.. and then your choice of men."

A beat.

Tomas blinks, comprehending Rodrik's addendum, before heeding his commands. Ser Rodrik watches the head guard weave his way through the people sitting, all the way over to that silver-eyed woman.

Clare turns to the approaching militiaman coming from the crowd.

"Miss," he goes, taking breaths.

"Yes?" Clare goes.

"Ser Rodrik wants me.. **checked**," he goes. Clare notices a gulp come down his exposed throat.

"Hold still," Clare goes.

Tomas stands as still as he could manage it.

She reaches her fingers out to his forehead.

Tomas felt his heart elevating as her fingers come. He shuts his eyes. His life will be over. Thirteen years of duty and he fears her fingers.

Some of his sweat is left on her fingers. The militiaman is relatively mundane.

"You can go," Clare says.

Tomas lets out a sigh. With a departing glance, he carries himself over to where his men are – standing amongst the people with their pikes and shields at hand.

Ser Rodrik sees the head guard go around and disappear behind the myriads of people. It is time to know what everyone has gathered here for. So he makes his way over to the very back by the standing Clare's side.

"Welcome all; welcome each of you. Welcome." His voice booms through the open spaces. "Right now, we gather all here in a conclave, for the purpose of.. allowing our visitor to **evaluate **your condition."

Ser Tomas brings along his four brave men over to the back – he hesitates; Ser Rodrik's speeches are of utmost importance in such a gathering as this.

"We-" Rodrik notices Tomas' approach with his men. He gives a nod over and turns his head to Clare in a gesture.

Tomas nods back, and leads his four men over to Clare.

"Apparent to general knowledge, is that there is a single Yoma out of one of us. But hold steady. Do not panic." Seeing the gang of children turn to madness is disaster. "If the Yoma were to pop and show itself amongst us now.. our friend Clare here shall deal with it, here and now." Rodrik half-expects the beast to come out from its camouflage at his taunt. But it doesn't. Murmurs. "But it won't, I see. That's to be expected."

A beat.

"So we hold **conclave**, as of right now," Rodrik goes. "Conclave. No one is to enter nor leave the vicinity."

Clare finishes checking all four of the watch, and lets them go. Tomas leads his guards through the fettered people, over to the main entrance. He pushes the grand gates open for his men to go out, before going out himself, and the gate is pulled shut with a bang by an adjacent watch. And on cue, the watch with the help of St. Hélène's servants bar the gate shut. No one will go in, and no one comes out while the Yoma remains breathing.

And on cue, paranoia shoots through the populace. People shy away from one another. It could be any one of them, and there is no space safe enough from anyone's grasp..

"This is nonsense!" This outburst comes from a man, calling out to Rodrik. "What the hell are you going to do? You're dooming us all, trapping us here with that thing!"

"Yes. And that thing is trapped with its bane," Rodrik goes. But his words don't mollify the crowd. Several of the people close by the empty space around Clare and the vizier start taking steps forward.

Rodrik draws his longsword.

"Stay back. Back off. **Way off**." He frantically points his sword to those who think of approaching. "Back away." And taking steps back, they reluctantly do. But the whole crowd is turning into chaos. The people turn to madness, with all its present allure. This is so bad.

Then some guy from the back throws a punch against someone – right in the face, making that someone reel back. Everyone starts-

A deafeningly loud clack catches everyone's attention – Rodrik had quite dulled his longsword in the name of order, having slammed it into the hard ground.

"**Enough! Enough!**"

The air of madness gives way to the voice of reason for now.

"Here's what we do. All of us who have not been checked, men, women and children – feel free to sit here and still in the main hall. No moving, and no talking. No pissing or shitting, nothing. When Clare has checked and found you clean, you shall move yourself to a chapel to wait – no second thoughts. Keep order and proper distance away from one another. After this ordeal is done.. I offer my apologies for the trouble."

Utter dead silence.

Ser Rodrik nods on to the standing Clare.

And she goes to start with the first row of many people. The lone sound of her boot clicks on the ground serves to magnify the feelings of apprehension. Icy touches against skin, one after the other. Those she has checked shuffle nervously their way over to a chapel room.

The first row is done now. Clare moves on to the second row and checks in the opposite direction. It is like sweeping; eventually, however long and tedious this is, the Yoma will be found-

A faint shriek from outside.

Clare stops.

The crowd looks on to Clare, curious as to why she has stopped. They stand on the very edges of their toes. Did she..?

It is a very faint shriek, pained, almost inhumane. It is faint, beyond the realm of normal hearing. It stops.

A beat.

"Outside," Clare goes. "The Yoma is outside.."

"What?" Rodrik goes.

"I can hear.. their screams," Clare goes.

Focusing yoki, she goes to make her legs fast.

Her legs contort under the yoki, strained.

Fast.

Her legs come with a newfound energy, erring to run it all off.

Fast.

Her heartbeats pound ravishly inside. People nearby cringe away from the sight of her silver eyes transitioning to the daemonic yellow of Yoma.

Clare shuffles her legs, making her way through the people as they start standing. Close by the entrance door, her cloak snags on something – a large hulk of a man; the fabric is caught between his fingers. She tugs her cloak free from him. As she turns to the door, she had thought she made out a little smile from his ragged face.

By the entrance door, Clare tries to push the massive entrance open – she notices it has been barred by way of an oak piece held in place.

From behind, she makes out Ser Rodrik giving instructions to have everyone hide within the chapels.

"Sorry," the watch goes. "I'll have it-"

Clare draws her hefty sword – and gives the oak piece a split down the middle – a loud crack. She then pushes the massive doors open, out to the light.

/

The sun is nearing the horizons, giving the sky its evening hues of pink, purple and blue. Its rays hit her face with light as she comes out the cathedral to the empty outside square.

The doors behind her slam shut.

How empty it feels. The vendor shops are sprawled around with no one to tend. Nary a sound, other than the inside commotion of the cathedral and her squeezing heartbeats. Clare looks all around, trying to remember which direction that shriek of pain came from.

More screams – they come from the right. Clare could almost feel the pain that makes the screams. She sheaths her greatsword on her back.

And she makes her legs dash her to the right in all haste.

Fast.

Her boots clack fast on the stone ground like the sounds of many hammers making chinks on nails.

Fast.

The empty surroundings are but sights of blurs, passing her by.

Fast.

The wind is a chafing breeze against her face.

Fast.

And another scream - more subdued this time. They are dying.

Clare forces more yoki down her body. _I must go faster... more faster..._ She could feel the bones and skin of face contort under the stress, as her feet and legs feel like they would rip apart without much further ado.

The screams become lowly whimpers. They get louder the closer she comes, but all the while getting softer as they die.

Faster.

She reaches the point where she could make the dying voices no louder to her. They come from her left – a narrow space leading down between the two stone buildings. Muffled their whimpers are. She lets the yoki go from her legs.

Clare draws the massive greatsword once again. Her heart pounds incessantly inside her. She makes her way down the spacing between – it slopes down..

down..

down until the sky seems to almost disappear between the long, dirt walls.

There is a door ajar that leads a way to darkness.

A long beat, where Clare stares on, contemplating the possible horrors yet to come.

Then, Clare goes in. Her greatsword leads her way.

/

As her eyes adjust to make subtle shades of light more perceptible, Clare notices a stairway leading further down to a blackness. It strongly reeks of the sour, bitter smell of blood here.

The whimpers are now little sobs.

Clare absorbs a last look back to the outside, and descends down the steps. Movements slow and tense. Clatters of boots on the steps. Heart beating. Heavy greatsword trembling in her slightly hands. She begins to glisten with sweat.

A loud clatter from below.

Clare gasps for control on her breaths, fighting for calm. Halfway down the steps now.

She makes her eyes adjust to more of the darkness, letting in as much light through her eyes as possible.

And there she could make out.. a puddle at the end, a darkened puddle at the end of the way. It stinks especially here.

No sound, other than her heart beating and erratic breathing. No sound. Not a sob, whimper or shout.

Clare tightens her two-handed grip on the sword. She moves on forward, to the puddle, to where the puddle comes from – another doorway.

Forward she goes. Her boots make somewhat of a splash on the wetness.

Clare stumbles, tripping on something in the dark – she cries out some of her fear, struggling blindly to hold onto something as she falls, can't find it, a free hand clawing desperately onto what it is- too late. She lands face flat onto the wet. Ouch!

A beat.

The musky sour stench is unbearable. It smells like raw, rotting meat, with a strange tinge of sweetness.

She regains herself. She notices her hand touching something.. something hard, smooth that glistens with cold wet. Blind in the dark, her fingers feel around it – the surface begins to feel dented..

and then comes upon something sticking out from it. Cold, corrugated.. and hooked sharp at the end.

Wait.

Her fingers frantically search around the body – feeling up to its neck, and its head, where another thing sticks out.

_What is.._

Screams. They sound as distant as before back in the cathedral, and much more painful than the ones that came from here. The screams come from back up, from outside.

Her heart skips a beat. _The Yoma – it moved this fast?_

Clare pulls herself upright amidst the darkness, picking up her greatsword. She sheaths it.

/

Coming outside – the sky is now the faint red and purple of dusk up above. Clare looks upon herself for a bit – she is covered in dabs of red blood all over her uniform.

The screaming continues, much worse.

Clare once more drives the yoki into her aching legs, and runs.

/...

Fast.

/...

She is panting, with her heart about to explode inside her. The square is empty as before.. perhaps more eerily so. The screaming had came from the cathedral.

There is the silence. Oppressive. Unnatural.

Clare manages her aching legs to the great cathedral's closed entrance. With a push, she tries opening the closed doors. They resist. The entrance must be barred from inside.

Clare focuses – willing for more strength to break open these doors.

In and out she breathes the cold, outside air.

And then, she throws the entirety of her body against the doors. Her body thuds against, making a loud slam but apparently having no effect.

She tries this again, over and over – hearing the faint splintering of the oak wood.

And at last, the grand doors give way.

/

Her footsteps clack on the stone floor, making a ghast echo through the place. Frescos of leering monsters, splattered entirely by red, decorate the spaces between the glazed windows high up beyond reach. Red is spread, splattered and smeared upon the open floor between Clare and the other end of the place.


	5. Chapter 5

**SCENE 5 –** Lurk

The twin doors behind her slam deafeningly shut, echoing through the devoid chamber.

The faint pink through the glazed windows provides little light for Clare to see the macabre scene of the main hall – it outlines everything in a dark, purple silhouette. Her rushed breaths brush out in bursts amidst the rotting stink.

This giant, oversized greatsword in her shaking hands is nothing better than an empty reassurance with nothing tangible to hit.

And even then, the looming eyes of the monsters on frescoes oppress. Any glances up.. and they will look back to her always in empty, yet threatening stares. If they do breathe air.. They're real enough to her, especially unnerving as they are.

Clare scours the place. The black shadows of the corners, where the darkness would hold haven to the daemonic being. Up high, where the darkened balconies lie.

She takes little, slightly steps on the stone floor. Her foot would take careful taps of the heel, and lay down her toes so slowly as to not make the distinct clacking her boots make. It would hear her.

Or maybe it is just in plain sight as an extension of the silhouettes. Spot it. Make sure that whatever lies seen, unmoving, is just because it isn't alive. What would be a child's leisurely game is now the basis for Clare's raison d'etre.

How in the hell does one thing travel so fast.. kill those guards by the edges of the village, then kill everyone else here like that? It had taken her so much effort just to rush so fast around.. and it just..

Step by step. Her heart is knocking hard enough to shake her chest and arms.

It just.. it had.. there is no way could anything move so fast. Nothing could do that, so far as Clare knows. There was Janet back then at training; Clare had seen her flash down the flat extending plains, and back again in a deafening boom. To this very moment, that was the fastest Clare had seen anybody move. But it left Janet lying in excruciating recovery. There was the dripping spittle down her mouth, and she would gasp for breaths, spent and trying to regain control over her fluctuating yoki.

Here, the Yoma left the braveheart guards pulverized from afar, managed to get past Clare on the way, come in here and do this. Come in here.. and break the oak barrier-

Her foot softly bumps onto something

_**it hurts**_

making a gurgle. There is the face contorted in a permanent pain, and half its body missing away, torn out from the fleshy stump. It's being digested. Clare lets out an utterance- _no_._ I must keep still, keep silent._

It had to have help. Maybe, there had to be more than one; one to kill the guards from afar (and distract Clare), and one other, here.

Still here.

The eyes of the immobile monsters stare on always.

Clare makes sure a wall provides support from behind.

Her eyes are rapidly juggling between the all-concealing shadows.. the balcony.. silhouettes.. and the people who lay now lifeless on the floor, once alive, who laughed some and loved some.

The spaulders mounted on her shoulders scuff softly the wall behind her. She nears an entryway leading to a sheer blackness.

Through her bouts of panicked breathing, Clare hears rustling at the very edge of her hearing. Or maybe it's just her imagination taking on the semblance of sound.

She is now straining to see the outlines of what were once silhouettes - all that is there is the low, blue glow of the glazen windows in the black, and even that is fading away as dusk gives its way. Then there will be nothing.

Now the shelter of the wall behind is gone; Clare is looming upon the entryway. There seems to be nothing inside.

The darkness is dizzying – she loses grip on her sense of place and direction. _Need to touch something.. edge of the wall. _

_What do I do? Wait here? Wait forever? Maybe.. maybe it's gone. I can't see. Stop. Listen. Stop and listen._

The greatsword is feeling more and more weighty, wavering in her wet hands. It tips over to the left, going the verge of clattering to the ground. She focuses but a bit on the falling blade. Something stirs in the deep beyond her focus-

It lunges –** right to her. **

Clare tries to pull herself out the way- it manages to slam, **hard, **obliquely against her right arm, pushing her aghast and over to the ground.

Her sword rushes away from her grip, clattering onto the ground.

As she whirls, she catches the dark blur flashing by her, ebbing against the ground to stop – sending laying bodies off and away in its midst.

She lands hard on her back – the sheath pokes onto her spine uncomfortably. Her head tinges. She pulls herself up, facing where the Yoma is on the other end, already rushing back-

The sword's purple silhouette nearby, Clare rushes - diving for the weapon, keeping the blur rushing to her in sight. As Clare goes to grasp the sword, she sees the blur stopping, slowing its lunge.

She hefts the sword up, a barrier between herself and it. There's something in its grasp, rising up, overhead**- **Clare raises the sword up to block. It slams against her sword, sending her tumbling back. She tries getting her footing back, slipping, and finally holding onto the wall beside to steady herself.

And she sees what she deals with, a face barely illuminated by the moonlight.

There is the form of Rodrik, his longsword in hand, and all of his hardened and hairy body showing. His face is inhumanly contorted, strained indecisively between utter anguish and sheer joy, twitching between the two. Tears glisten from his cheeks. He cries. It laughs.

Clare grasps hard onto her sword, poised to strike. Rodrik's body in turn assumes a defensive, riposte posture, bringing Rodrik's sword up to match her's.

He- it stands surprisingly assertive, an experienced fighter.

It is the Yoma's sick joke playing out on her. Along with taking on the physical form of a person, the Yoma could also take on the person's memories, traits, skills. It could have taken many fighting techniques and experience from many different people, and it has the added benefit of its superhuman physicality. After coming off with everyone before, it chose to be Rodrik to Clare. It's asking her to come. _What is it waiting for?_

Clare grips the smooth finished handle of her greatsword, intimidated. She hesitates for a moment, feeling something is very wrong, before deciding to throw aside the doubt and going in to kill.

She throws her sword around to its head- it clashes away her blow and gracefully repoises.

Clare recovers herself. Deep within her, is that hate, welling, bringing a savage energy to her, impelling her to make it suffer like she had suffered.

_Harder. _

Clare lunges at its head, throwing her sword overhead. It meets not the head, but the longsword, miraculously appearing just short of scratching him. Their blades tinge against each other in resistance – Clare's rage against its will.

It makes Rodrik's face contort to a hideous smile.

Then it thrusts the longsword forward, shoving Clare backward, landing on her back.

Clare half-expects a coup de grace (_and end it all_), before she pulls herself back standing en guarde. There it is, standing, with the longsword almost sticking into her face.

Gaining some respect for the Yoma's finesse, this time she cautiously approaches the Yoma with slow, unprovoking steps forward. It steps backward, matching her.

Clare throws a provoking gesture with her sword. It steps back.

Another gesture. It steps back.

Clare studies the Yoma for a moment, in disbelief. She could not help but notice the little thing dangling between its legs in the shadow, imagining half-heartedly it managing to bear children, before taking this moment to try a forceful swing by the side, hoping to make a scratch on this proud thing. Her sword lands itself in the wall with a deafening clash, sending pieces of stone flying off.

The Yoma takes a thrust over- Clare rips out the caught sword from the wall, managing to catch its blow, just barely. The blades meet loudly, crossing, meeting close to her slight breasts, moving all so closer..

And there, their eyes meet for what seems an endless moment.


	6. Chapter 6

**SCENE 6 –** The Flower that Lost its Kindness

The swords scathingly scrape against one another, all the while pressing against Clare's breasts – harder and harder and harder, cutting through the cloth, jutting into her skin. She finds herself barely holding ground, skidding back against her will.

Her arms and wrists falter, overtaxed, threatening to snap. She could almost picture them fracturing like a twig. Clare decides to stop resisting, and instead helps herself to the Yoma's push, leaping as far back as she could help it, finally landing plenty of strides away from the beast.

Her shoulders rise up and down in tandem with her exerted breaths.

Ahead, the Yoma takes its slow, calculated steps towards her, with its mocking teary-eyed stare.

_I need more.. more.._

Clare strains out more yoki to her will, groaning, the arousing energies swelling inside her. She feels her legs and arms cringe and tighten, and her face flushing with warmth. The ebbing pain seeps away from her aching wrists. In her hands the greatsword begins to feel more at ease, no longer feeling so cumbersome.

She grips with all strength the greatsword's handle.

The Yoma passes through the darkness for a moment.

With coursing rage, Clare lunges to the being. She grunts out as she throws most of her force on her swing to its stomach.

Anticipating another effortless deflection, she forces back back her sword at the last moment- seeing the longsword flash out to the left, to meet nothing-

Clare arcs her sword up to brush past the longsword. She feels it hit something; not the sudden hardness of a parry for once but the soft flesh - its arm. And to Clare's delight, the proud blood through the deranged simulacrum meets air for the first time. She feels spatters over her bare cheeks, feeling lukewarm.

Its arm dangles down an unnatural way, hanging with just what connected tissue is still there, stretched. Blood gushes, spurts out from the gap where her sword has embedded, dripping down all to the ground.

It makes a hideous, ear-piercing shriek; Rodrik's longsword is wildly flashing about in its grip – slamming every which way and bashing against the adjacent wall, columns, in thundering collisions of debris. It thrashes all over, losing control over the body.

Clare holds stubbornly onto her sword, unwilling to let go through the jabs of motion. She finds herself rushing along with the turns of Rodrik's body, slamming hard against the wall. The motions make her own stomach churl inside. She could feel the half-digested food inside her slushing around so sickeningly.

Its blood spills all over her in still-warm wet.

In the frantic blurs, Clare could have sworn the half-torn arm coming back alive. Her hands have taken the strain far enough. With another jerk, her fingers slip, and she clatters down against the wet cold ground.

The Yoma whirls around, slamming against the wall once more – finally dislodging the greatsword from its great monstrous body. As it clatters lowly on the stone floor, the Yoma looks around- finding the darkness through the doorway.

Then it is gone.

/...

Clare is lying alone on the cold floor with the once living. Some look back on her with sullen, empty eyes. What will of hers there was has drained gone. She hopes for nothing more than to submit to the nothingness where which she drifts to.

_Then why are you here?_

Clare does not know. All these moments for nothing but death.

_Then what is your hand for?_

Those little hands of hers, laying limp. They tried. They ache and ebb on the joints. They couldn't.

_Then why does your heart go on?_

Deep within herself, Clare searches her heart for that little strand, maybe whispering still, called hope. Where had hope lead her to? It wouldn't bring back the treasured love of mama and papa, and it wouldn't bring back the tenderness and warmth of Teresa. It left everyone here dead when they should be living on in peace. Hope mocks and agonizes her with a dream that never will come. Ever.

And deep within, her heart is swelling up, so much

_hate_

_sorrow_

_bitterness_

_despair_

_rage_

overwhelming in her, screaming all at once to come out whichever way they can.

Her lonely heartbeats beat on in the silence.

What now? There's herself – a pathetic, pitiful.. little self. All there's left for her is the rest of her time in the world to live on, ponder around those thoughts in her head.

Tears come. At first they are the unsure drops that come so timidly, whether it is all right to let go in the moment. They might hear her.

Then they do come.

/...

When the tears could no longer come from her stinging eyes, all that is left is the emptyness, so tired out. No – not just empty, but a sort of vague yet hateful coldness, she thought only came from those onlookers upon herself.

What now? There's herself, indeed there is. Otherwise there would be no pain.

Then there's the Yoma

_**die**_

that still lives on.


	7. Chapter 7

**SCENE 7 –** Carry On

With a new vigour, Clare pulls herself up to stand. Something feels different. That little uncanny feeling that had scratched at the back of her head feels more tangible, more open now. It tugs on a past monstrous presence.

It is traces of the Yoma's yoki lingers in the deathly air, dwindling away in the moment. She can feel it. She doesn't know **how **she came to feel it. There's an otherworldly voice whispering something in her, but she can't seem to hear what exactly.

Something comes upon the tip of her tongue – wanting to speak out in defiance and proclamation to the world. Her lips move and utter out, but can't seem to form the words that want to come.

Clare tries to grasp hard onto this feeling, clenching her hands as if they can help it.

_You.. you come to murder everything that life cherishes so dearly. You pillage, kill and destroy, for fun. You came to me before and.. and stole **everything **from me. I hated you. I hate you, and I will hate you, you, and everything you have done._

_Now I come to you. I come in the name of everything and everybody you wronged - I will find you I will kill you, child of the bitch._

A low nod comes to Clare, as if to reaffirm those driving words in her head. Then she wipes the wetness from her stinging eyes and sniffles in the dripping from her nose – a rush brimming to her head. She swipes away the Yoma's blood, glistening, from her face.

In the lightless night, she steps over to the greatsword that glimmers even so amongst the blackness, and picks it back up in hardened hands.

She follows instinctively the one feeling naggling her on, having it nag further on as she takes her steps – over through the archway into the pitch black, where the Yoma had gone..

Her footsteps clack, echo along the hollow, unseen walls. Her stifled breathing and pounding heart go on as most of the only noises. A distant cracking though, like the snapping of twigs or rather.. fire. Clare looks around wherever she could – finding an orange glow somewhere far off down the imposing hall, light bouncing off the stone revealing contours of empty doorways.

_Is there someone still alive?_

Some relief pours into her heart, letting away the anxiety a bit, before the realization came that the Yoma had went down these halls – it might be the one making the light, beckoning Clare over.

The inner air makes its breeze around Clare, brushing her skin with coolness, blowing her cropped hair around.

Clare stops herself for the moment, hesitant to go on. She is afraid – of dying, becoming another mere body, yet there's something else far beyond that. The hapless woman stands at the threshold of the inner darkness inside her – and the monster beneath - always looming ever since, which she longed to avoid acknowledge let alone confront. But the orange is beckoning.

So she takes a deep breath into her little lungs, and carries on.

Step by step, the orange glow flickering comes closer. Then there's some flickering over of a shadow, jutted out in a contour of an organic shape, before it disappears away in her blink. A little slithering sound on edge of hearing. Something of deep breathing, barely held back before abruptly letting off to the silence.


	8. Chapter 8

**SCENE 8 –** Heavenward

The fire around the corner shines its orange along the stone walls. Clare sees the still-glowing embers drift out in her direction, fading away to black ashes. Something is continually nagging on the back of her mind, dull, unnerving. She could fall into a deep hole, and fall forever into the abyss.

Clare inches her head around the corner, before going through.

The lone torch hung low on the wall shines light along the empty hallway drenched in the red. Beyond that seems to lie the faint shape of a grand stairway that spirals up to heaven.

The red trail seems to end at a closed door along the way. Something juts out in the middle of all this from the blood – small, round. It's an ear.

In spite of the overbearing pull of her greatsword, fluttering in her hands, Clare decides to wield it one-handed, while picking up the illumination with her left. The air whispers, and the flames burn on.

She makes her way following the red on the stone floor to the closed wooden door. Then she holsters the torch under her arm. Giving a twist to the ring handle, she unlatches the door. It slowly turns open on its own.

There within is a small room of sorts, holding dusty, upturned stools stacked over each other, and a man with his purple robes laying out along the stools, covered with his red. His skin is drained of all its warmth. His wide open, reddened eyes stare on, and his mouth is slack-jawed - an inhuman grin baring his blood-soaked teeth and pulsing gums.

On a longer look, Clare realises that his lips have been torn out so violently – the red drips down his chin.

A long beat.

Clare thinks it best to grant the servant his long-desired peace with his patron saint. She steps forth with the torch in hand, and holstering the torch once more, she reaches out to close his eyes-

He latches onto her hand so hard. His eyes turn to her.

"Hel- help me." His teeth move in tandem with his words sounding so inarticulate and muffled. Red drips down his mouth as he tries to speak some further.

Clare lets a frightened gasp out. _He's __**alive**__?! _The words to say escape her for a moment - stunned under his sudden feisty grip. She recovers her composure.

"What happened?" she goes.

His teeth clenches, teeth scraping on each other, as he tries to say his words. Then he retches out that burst of red that had lingered so long in his throat – straight down beside Clare splattering on the ground.

Clare's own jaw and throat tingle.

"G-gg he-" he goes. "He- it hurts.. it hurts so much.."

Clare lays the torch along the side. Then she kneels down with him.

"Do you know where it is now?" Clare goes.

"Came- took children away.. left me here.. to die." Tears come from his eyes and drip down his motted cheeks.

A beat.

"It's all right now," Clare goes. "It's all right.."

The servant's purple robes is all but entirely drenched and dripping with blood. He couldn't have bled that much from just his inflamed mouth.

"Where else does it hurt?" she asks.

The man seems to cradle something, so nervously, under the cover of his robes.

"M- my.."

Clare looks behind her to the unsure darkness exposed by the open door. There's a slight flicker of movement – maybe from the chaotic light of the fire. She goes to push the door shut and turns to be with the man in his last throes of life. As she gently lifts his robes up, she is surprised on how wet with blood they are – filled so much of the warm wet. The blood drips down along her hand, cold, down to her bracers where it finally goes to drop away to the cold ground.

She sees something glisten under, so dark to be able to see what exactly, but it brings something of utter pain to just try imagining what agony he has to bear.

"Hold on."

Taking the man's velvet robes into hand, she tears most of the cloth into her hands, leaving his naked, drained skin showing in the firelight.

Then Clare sees under the remaining cloth, his left arm is gone. Red blood pours down the grisly stump even now. The man lets out a throaty gasp.

Clare pulls away the leftover velvet, smooth flowing on her fingertips, away from the man's left shoulder. She goes to tie the cloth around the stump – recalling some of the survival training before. Around covering up the stump.. and tight enough to halt the blood flow..

The result looks so crude and ruffled on his arm but it should help.

His skin is drained of all its warmth. His wide open, reddened eyes stare on to her weakly, and his mouth is slack-jawed – a faint smile mustering with his exposed teeth and gums.

Then he looks upon her for a last time.

"Clare.. I.. I'm sorry.."

She looks to him wonderingly –_ what is there to feel sorry for? _

"I know.. you tried the best you could- tried to save.. us.."

His eyes wince.

"I see.." he goes, choking up. A tear glistens in his eyes, dripping down his face. Then he breathes in a last, and gives a final, brave composure to his words. "I see her courage in your eyes and I know everything will be all right.. I can see St. Hélène.. you.. out by my side.. Maybe when I'm with her, I hope to look down upon this world, and see you.. carry her bre.."

That dying flame that had held on in his eyes lets go, and fades.

And for a moment of eternity, Clare looks on to his eyes, and ponders what his heaven must be like. Then she goes to give him grace, and closes his eyes for his peace.

And for her moment, the young Clare begins to feel something beyond all her comprehension - of a vast, otherworldly nature. It faintly caresses her, comforting, reassuring. A little tinge of hope, for where she would take herself next, if anywhere.

Finally, Clare turns to face the closed door. With determined steps, she grasps the iron handle – cold and hard on her fingers, turns it, and pushes the barrier open.

/

She finds herself back in the open corridor leading to the grand stairway up heavenward. The flames in her held torch show only the shallowest of the depths around her in yellow light. Lying aghast on the floor is a slightly woman, headless. Her stomach has burst open, covering her familiar grey clothing and silver armour in red.

A far cracking echoes down the hall.

She turns to face the dark depths on the other end, at the entering corner. As she strains to peer her eyes into the blackness, she can make out something faint, approaching – little. It rolls, tumbling, scraping little pieces of itself along the ground. Strands of something light swaying along.

It becomes clear in the light of the flames. The head slows down to a timid crawl – stops by Clare's feet. Its cropped, yellowing hair has the red blemish of the blood. Her face looks upwards, back to her with blood-soaked, silver eyes

_it hurts _

She finds herself back in the open corridor leading to the grand stairway up heavenward. The flames in her held torch show only the shallowest of the depths around her in yellow light. Its flickers and ambers are reflected in sinister light in the pools of red along the hallway.

The strange sense that had been ebbing on dully is now clawing on her nerves, wanting to scream out on something, anything at all. There's a familiar, imposing presence here..

Clare readies her greatsword defensively with both her hands, letting the torch drop to the ground. She turns to face the dark depths at the other end, by the corner. The Yoma, holding a glint of long steel in its gnarly hand.

For a first time, she sees the brimming, daemonic yellow of its eyes, looking back to her coldly from the dark. It takes slow, approaching steps toward her, and she sees its grotesque, gargantuan deformed self under the flickering yellow show more clear and clear with each of its steps.

Clare looks on back with her silver eyes, holding tight onto her sword.

Then she draws within her the same daemonic flow to her body – through her arms, legs and very self, with the strengthening feelings of it all coursing in her veins. Her silver eyes change into the yellow rage, as her own body goes to deform itself to a more powerful, rigid feel.

A beat.

At first her steps are timid and shaky as she goes to approach the monster. Each of her own steps sink deep in the ground, boots scraping on the rough stone and splashing the red blood.

It takes another billowing step.

Along the edge of her mind, sweet hope reveals its warmth so briefly a moment.

She forces herself to move her stubby legs faster, and faster – Clare is coming to a run now. The Yoma is just a minute length ahead.

Clare prepares to feint a length-wise swing to the Yoma's gut, holding the sword out to her side.

She can reach it now – the stink of its coarse, decayed self comes to her.

Clare carries out her feinted swing, turning her hips through and forcing her arms around. She half-expects the longsword in Yoma's hand to appear up all the sudden to meet.. nothing. Halfway through the carrying motion, she pulls her sword up at the last moment, making it curve a different way, straight around and down, down to its head.

She finds her breath knocked out from her in a hard blow to her stomach. As she finds herself hurling in the air, the numbing pain comes. Clare sees the out-extended foot of the Yoma in the blurs.

The young woman crashes to the bloody ground, face up. Her sword makes its clattering somewhere farther down.

Clare brings her head up – seeing the Yoma come in a rush to her this time. She brings herself upright standing, finding the glimmer of her sword close to the torch on the ground.

A low growl behind.

Clare scrambles to retrieve her sword. She falters, her weak legs almost collapse back down as she heads on over to her only weapon. The pounding footsteps of the Yoma are behind her.. louder.. closer..

She barely manages her fingers around the smooth grip, before the Yoma's low breathing is brushing along her bare skin – the sour, pungent stench going up her nose as she breathes in. Turning around, Clare sees the longsword in Yoma's hands come – it's lunging straight to tear her own stomach open-

Clare swings her sword – a blur to her eyes – it hits hard against the Yoma's sword, just barely nudging its thrust out the way. It instead rips through her side. She tries to bury down the scathing pain just swelling from the open flesh, as she tries to avoid more of its oncoming blows, forcing her back more and more.

Her parries are met with harshly, ebbing her wrists and arms. Pieces of the stone fly off in the dust in deafening noise when the Yoma barely misses her. Some of the dust comes to her eyes, making them sting, having Clare blinking more.

Clare finds utter exhaustion settling down upon her; her lungs strain to breathe the deathly air, and her sword parries feel more slow and cumbersome, until she loses all will to carry out her arms - having to resort dodging its heavy blows. And even then..

She is knocked back down at the foot of the spiralling stairs. The Yoma swipes away the last of her defence, sending her arms fumbling away to the side.

It brings the longsword down to her exposed throat, and everything seems to come to a close.

"You are beaten. It is **useless** to resist. Don't let yourself be destroyed as everyone else did."

The longsword seems to leer closer, shaking little in its controlling hand - threatening. Clare tries to shift her own head and lungs as far away from the cutting tip, against the edge of the climbing stairs.

Its yellow eyes grimace.

Clare is helpless, sprawled out on the stairs. No matter how she looks at it, the longsword would make an unmoving body, lifeless, out of her. She begins to whimper a little, just a little to herself..

The longsword.. sticking in her face..

_**no**_

With only her drive and heart beating on, she finds it in herself to punt away the Yoma's blade, pushing away the longsword with her bracers. Clare reaches once more for her greatsword. And for the briefest moment where she could budge away certainty, she gives the Yoma a quick kick along its leg – making it stumble just enough to have her chance to escape.

Clare struggles to pull herself up the stair case – spiralling so high up to a dark heaven. Hot sweat pours down the the sides of her face, as she manages to have her legs break for it, away from the Yoma, away from the monster..

Up, and up she goes on the stairway to heaven. She runs until the torch light far down seems but a glimmer in the dark. She runs until her muscles come so close to tearing apart and her lungs squeeze out. And even then, she runs up over to the endless depths, never minding the low panting that follows her incessantly.

/

Clare comes to the pinnacle of which the cathedral extends to in the sky. The air gusts forth, blowing coolness along her sweat-soaked self. A large bell looms in the middle of the limited area. Beyond all this, is utter, unsure darkness where she can fall.. forever.

Then she hears the panting that goes on behind her, and turns around to face the upcoming Yoma.

It lunges to her in an enraged swing, and Clare immediately raises her heavy sword to meet its blow. Another lunge to her. Clare backs away, careful not to bump the gargantuan bell.

The cold air blows through her cloak, ruffling it in the wind.

The Yoma leaps out from the doorway, and decides to make a long, hard swing to Clare's head, to the darkness beyond. Its blade clangs deeply against the bell, cutting through it with such force-

Clare makes her sword stop the blade's way from doing her in – but with her resistance, the longsword manages its force against her whole body, sending her tumbling to the edge. She barely recovers her balance, before she goes to an offensive stance, about to take her stand.

The Yoma bashes its longsword hard on the bell. The sound is so harsh, resonating hard with the Yoma, and Clare – it stuns her, making her topple.

In that instant, the Yoma comes down upon Clare's forearms, cutting them off to the wind's pleasure. They, and her sword in the grip, fly down and away..

With utter pain peeling at her stumps, Clare tumbles at the edge, falling over-

But the Yoma catches her by her ankles at the last moment.

Clare screams in pain as the Yoma holds on at the joint.

"I wonder.. what a Claymore shall taste like.." the Yoma goes. "You are sure feisty, and I enjoy those who put up a good fight. I really do.."

Its forked tongue stretches out of its mouth. The Yoma leans itself in closer to her legs, and has its tongue go about exploring her leg, slithering, dripping its saliva along.

The blood rushes to Clare's head so much – she almost passes out from the strain.

Then to her horror, the Yoma's tonguestabs into her right leg.

"AAUUH!"

As its tongue penetrates deeper, Clare's screams, out in the pain, out in the insanity.

All she wants to do.. is to be away from all this. Away from this hell, this hellish Yoma, from its tongue. Away..

She longs for the happier times, with Mama, with Papa – however so vague they were in her memory now. Mama's loving embrace, when something bad would happen – Mama would come, hug her, wanting her to be happy. She longs for the happier times with Teresa, who was just so kind to her out of all the world. If they were only here..

The Yoma stops its tongue's excursions.

"Your taste.."

A beat.

"When I taste you.. you're something to get used to.. but.."

The Yoma resumes its excursions inside her leg.

"Auug.."

Something is very wrong.

Clare could feel it prodding her – her mind and heart.

"Yes.."

_No.._

Clare withdraws further into herself. She tries to hide away from the horrible reality, but there is no way to hide the feelings and thoughts that go on in her mind. The Yoma's consciousness is entering that private haven.

"**No!**" Clare screams.

"Ohh.." it goes. "Mama..! and Papa..!"

These two words, once so loved, are crooked from the Yoma's mouth.

"Ohh.. you wish they are here? Don't you? Hugs and all?"

The Yoma prods further into her.

"Teresa!" it goes. "Oh.. Teresa! Like your second mother.. after she died.."

Clare snaps.

"Don't you say.." Clare finally goes. "Don't you **ever say her name!**"

She wrestles against its grip with a superhuman frenzy she had never known. Harder, and harder, until she could feel its tongue rip out from within her and its hands go slack..

She is free.

The wind ebbs along her as she falls.

She is free.

Her limbs flail in the maddening air as she falls.

In the blurs, she sees the cathedral beside her rise up to the heavens.

Clare is a fallen angel of the heavens, coming down through the clouds to meet the ground.


	9. Chapter 9

**SCENE 9 –** At Eternity's Gate

And as Clare falls, she sees the red droplets of blood drip out from her legs and arms.

Above her, the ground is coming down out of the blackness.

She decides to close her eyes for one last time.

When she opens her eyes again, she sees the first white snowflake drifting along her side. So beautiful it is as it goes to dance with her around her head in wondrous tufts of motion.

And another.

And many more come down in the air.

Together, they make a white blanket on the ground for which to have Clare lay on.

The ground comes to a gentle slow where Clare lies to rest in the soft, glittering snow.

It seems a long, never-ending moment; many of the countless flakes dawdle above in the black night, and go to their rest by her side in the field of white.

"_Clare.._"

The tender voice to her ears is sweet honey, soothing in her mind. All her troubles seem to melt away from her heart to another place.

"_Clare.._"

Upon hearing her name called out again, Clare perks her head upright from the field of snow, and looks around. The whiteness stretches on forever, beyond horizons and all of bitter time.

The voice evokes a pleasant deja vu in her – something of a bliss and happiness that had tugged at her some moments before. Strong, husky-sounding, the voice must have belonged to a good person she had known.

Clare frantically searches for where the voice calls from – all around, longing more to be with her.

So Clare wrestles herself to stand. It is hard, without her hands. The spaulders mounted on her shoulders drag her back down. The flakes of falling snow stick to her, slowly melting on her skin.

She stretches up her arms, up to the sky and the endless sea of stars.

The stars smile back, and give her hands to feel, and the first sensation these hands have is the grasp of another hand that goes to pull her up.

And Clare sees the face of the one woman who gave her happiness. It is a face full of meanings Clare could forever recall. Memories could be seen flashing there on her doll-like face – of rich times. Of love.

"Teresa?"

Her lips purse to make a faint smile.

"Hello, Clare."

All these times, Clare had longed to embrace and be with her again, and be loved by her in the loneliness. The young woman tries to say something out of the deepest corners of her heart, where she had cradled her own feelings from the world of harshness. The words don't seem to come.

But that is all right. Instead of words, Clare goes to give Teresa a hug in the field of snow, and together they share the tenderness in their moment.

Some tears stream down from Clare's eyes, onto Teresa.

"I'm afraid."

"What is there to be afraid of?" Teresa goes.

A long beat.

"I.. I don't know."

"Then you don't need to be afraid," Teresa goes. "Anymore."

"I couldn't save them."

"You can still save the children," Teresa goes.

"But I'm.. so weak."

"I live on, in you," Teresa goes. "When your heart beats, I do too. And should you ever come to a moment without hope, let my hope fill your void."

Clare could not help but let out all of her tears, and hold onto Teresa closely. The snowflakes swell all around them, filling the air.

"You have to live on," Teresa goes.

"I don't want to go.. I don't want to leave you.."

"I will always be with you, Clare," Teresa goes.

And Teresa in Clare's arms disappears into the snow.

Clare is left staring at the emptiness she holds and cradles. A sense of benevolence, inside her, that fills her heart with so much hope – all at once – that it seems to be too much for her, and her heart will burst. Then she remembers to relax, and stops trying to hold onto it. And it flows through her like tears in rain.


	10. Chapter 10

**SCENE 10 –** Reflections of Clare

"Clare."

The dull pain is ebbing everywhere inside her. She hears the husky voice, and yet she longs for the snow, for Teresa amongst her blackness.

"Clare!"

Reluctantly, she opens her eyes, to see Rubel in the backdrop of a grey morning sky, in his down suit and hat, kneeling down by her side.

"Ahh, so you are awake." He scratches the side of his bald head in a little amusement.

Her eyes sting from the open air.

"Rubel.." Clare goes.

"Let me guess what must be going through that head of yours," he goes. His bespectacled eyes hides whichever feelings would show on his whimsical face. "The Yoma has eluded the swipe of your claymore, Clare, and right now you have this inner guilt, welling in your heart for those you have failed."

Her slight wince proves him correct.

"Ahh. So I see," he goes.

Clare barely holds back a sniffle. She feels so worn out and weary; what happened before is a nightmare she wishes is just a nightmare, and nothing more than that. But there is all the red blood all on her grey, tattered uniform – that clotting gash along her side, and the empty, silent air.

"I.. can't.." Clare goes in weak murmurs. "Don't want this.. people having to die.. because of me. Get someone else.. to do this. Probably the Yoma's out there.. killing more people."

Rubel perks his head, noticing Clare on the verge of losing it. "If you make this decision now to be.. afraid, then you will never turn back. Your whole life, you will always.. be afraid."

A beat.

"You cannot change the deaths of so many lives," Rubel goes. "So many who had once lived.. and laughed. All the past will do, is hold you down in a well of sorrow and regret. But what you do have in front of you, is the future, always coming by. And it is in the future, **your **future, that will count, where you still can do something of it, as long as you live and breathe."

Rubel's words seem to resonate, and settle somewhere in Clare's heart. She wants to utter something, anything in response to his words, but all that she could muster is a low mumble.

"I know the rage that drives you," Rubel goes. "That anger, strangling your grief so much until the memory of those you have loved is just poison in your veins. One day, you catch yourself wishing that they never existed, so you would be spared your pain. This anger, it will give you great power deep down from your heart, the will.. but if you let it, it will destroy you."

Clare grimaces.

"But first," Rubel goes. "Are you gonna go on, like this – all beaten up?"

He grins.

His hands pull out from behind him another grey uniform, intact, and lays it down just in front of Clare's reach. Her hands slowly go to reach out to the cloth in her fingers.

"And here.. you might need this," Rubel says.

He lays out her greatsword on the ground.

While Rubel looks away to contemplate the desolate surroundings, Clare takes off all of her dented armour to lay it out beside her. She strips off her grey uniform so her bare self is open to show. Her eyes glance down at her self, stopping on a bruised, painful-looking scar down by her stomach, where they put in Teresa's flesh and gave her yoki to fight on. It sends a little tingle inside her, looking at it.

_Hurt..? Much..?_

Clare lets her fingers go around the scarred area on her stomach - a numbing feeling there to the touch. Then she folds the old tattered, blood-stained uniform by the side, and slips herself into the new one Rubel has provided for her.

Rubel could not help but have a sneak peek on the still-dressing Clare, who is starting to find her new suit strangely loose-fitting on her petite self.

In the distance, a bird begins to chirp.

Once Clare has finally finished dressing herself, she gives a tap on Rubel's shoulder to let him know.

"There are no other jobs awaiting for you now," Rubel goes. "I suggest you take this chance to give yourself a rest. I can't begin to imagine how tired you must feel.. s_o, until then."_

_But deep inside, Clare is anything but tired. The Yoma's yoki, still faintly lingering in the air, is a little child tugging on her legs, begging her to come along._

_Then something changes in her – a subtle feeling. The empty void in her heart has found something, wishing to be filled. An inner will takes grasp of her, and she knows just what to do._

_"Rubel!" Clare goes. He turns around. "Would you have another cloak along with you?"_

Despite his bespectacled eyes, she sees surprise fill his usually whimsical face.

"Hm.." he goes. "I thought you'd be used to the chill already. But if you insist."

Rubel's hands rummage through his inventory once more – stopping as his fingers find something wooly. He pulls out a grey, hooded poncho, and offers it out to Clare.

She takes it into her grasp.

Rubel walks away into the distance to take care of other things.

And for a long time, Clare stands still, thinking it all over. The air blows through her and the empty village that once was. Finally, she puts on the grey poncho – it covers all of her self in its garb, drooping to the ground by her legs.

And her legs carry her on the trail of the Yoma's yoki.


	11. Chapter 11

**SCENE 11 – **Blood Simple

At the start when Clare follows the trail of yoki, she is unsure of herself, wandering down the open, ambiguous wilderness of forest. She could feel it gnaw along her joints as she has taken her steps down the dirt path. Step by step though, she feels a sort of inner strength beginning to fill her self. Once, or maybe twice on her way, when she has snagged herself along the hanging branches of the trees, her surroundings seem to waver and pulse for a little moment, and she could hear their struggling whimpers.

Now Clare stands utterly still before the guarding gates of a town, and the feeling pounds madly inside – the Yoma is here. And something else too – another of her kind.

Beneath her poncho, she goes to reach into a little pocket under her left bracer and pulls out a yoki suppression pill. She swallows the brown marble in a gulp. What bitterness on her tongue. The Yoma shall not feel her presence, and neither will her comrade who resides inside.

She waits for the daemonic energy within her to cease its throbbing. Her silver irises regain their pigmentation to her darker, normal green, and the sheathed greatsword begins to pull her down with just her own muscles against its weight. Clare is all but entirely human now.

When at last she could feel the long lost humanly warmth come blushing, Clare takes in a breath of the chilling air into her lungs. She puts on the hood of her poncho – covering the hilt of her claymore from behind. Then she goes to show herself to the East gates with determined, clacking steps.

Wait. That clacking might give herself away as a 'Claymore'. Clare pauses, looking down to her feet, before continuing on, letting her footsteps fall on the dirt path so soft as to be nigh silent.

Clare stops before the solid barrier of iron. Her legs and arms seem to jitter, weightless and unsure. Some nervous moments waiting, until a slot slides open to reveal the eyes of a surly, wizened soldier.

"Who are you? What **business** brings you here at Ecba?"

There is something unsettling about this woman alone in her hooded cape, though the soldier could not ascertain what exactly. He cautiously lays his hand on the hilt of his short sword, trying not to make it conspicuous to her.

_It approached the gate in the late night, carrying an ungodly, weighty sack on its back. _

"_A trader!" the soldier said from the other side. "What would be your business here?"_

"_I am Erasmas," it said. "My business here is my own."_

_There was a slight twitching of the sack, and this the soldier did not see. Instead he pensively eyed the sack – tried imagining the strain it felt from the carried weight. _

"_All right, all right," the soldier said. "I meant you no offence."_

_Then the gate unlatched, and it let itself into the town._

Clare recalls the tedious training of masquerades back then, where they had taught her to be a wide variety of persons, from the high-brow shun of royal nobility, to the seductive smile of a lulling courtesan. She had thought many times over and over on the uses of pretending to be personas she isn't, when she would be out there fighting away the Yoma. This moment here shows her why.

"I'm on my way to Elkhazg," Clare goes, disarming nervous laugh, "stopping by here for I cannot carry on walking any longer."

"Elkhazg?" The soldier roars out in derisive laughter, along with his comrades behind him. "You're.. going **there**?" They whisper amongst themselves – God only knows what they say. An empty pit sucks down in her stomach.

"No.. no, never mind that.." the soldier goes. "Not my business to prod in. Apologies."

A beat.

"Say.. where is it you hail **from**?" the soldier goes.

Clare freezes.

"There's rising talk of a terrible massacre in Norslof - everyone's slaughtered from a Yoma attack.. brutal. Now it seems we're having one of these monsters running rampant in our own town." His voice becomes panicked all the sudden. "It.. it.. we had one of those damn silver-witches come by." He shivers. "Just.. go on. You'd be better off sleeping off in the woods. Can't be too careful. I'd rather you not.."

"I'll take my chances," Clare goes.

A long, tense beat.

To Clare's relief, the sound of a latch sliding free comes, and the gate is hoisted up for her passage. And as she goes her way down the winding entrance street, she gives a faint hint of a smile to the soldiers. If they have blushed so behind her back, Clare could not care less.

She finds herself in a quiet corner, staring out at the faces of the many people who go about their lives – walking, scared. The lingering traces of the yoki in the air has been scattered through and through - thinning slices of butter spread out along the bread.

She starts to them.

Clare passes by a familiar statue of black, towering over the area; an angel lifting a dying one to heaven. There's the warmth in her and she moves through the first group of people, a crisscross of cold-faced peasants who brush by her, lightly bumping her as they move

_**so vivid**_

_It looked down at the drunken tramp, who lay down by the side of the empty street. The tramp moaned babbles as he rolled on his side. It looked at him as it went to see if no one is looking. It thinks it will have just a bite.. _

_one tiny, little innocent bite_

nervously.

A little glance to the side, and there's a certain spot of a faded, smudged red and brown stain which the people are more than willing to avoid. Clare does not stop moving. She adjusts the poncho hood lower down her face, hiding it more in the shadows.

Her steps are more frantic.

Approaching the open, crowded sprawl of the marketplace, Clare carefully weaves her way through the people, eyeing each with as much suspicion as they do her and each other. Especially of the one who stands aperched in the midst of it all, eyes closed in a false serenity and long platinum hair wavering in the motions of the people.

Clare neither recognizes her face, nor her symbol down her neck. What she does recognize is the very familiar uniform and lightly armour she wears, and the smooth hilt of the greatsword seemingly oversized on her back.

For the moment, Clare worries whether her own yoki is so suppressed down away as to not get caught by her other comrade, let alone the Yoma.

Her heart tenses under, and she feels the rapid thumping inside her, bringing waves of warmth over to her face in a blush.

A young boy, seated down as his mother goes by to banter with a trader, slowly pulls a peashooter from his pocket, puts a pea in his mouth and raises the pipe to his lips – aiming to the aperched woman there.

His mother's hand shoots out and grabs it. "Little beast! I thought Mummy told you not to bring that horrid thing. Can't you behave?"

"Mummy! Lookit! That woman there standing funny! Mummy! Why is she standing so funny?"

Clare walks past them, following the traces of yoki in the air. As she does, she hears from behind the mother answer - "She's looking for monsters about, little dear. Best hope you're not one of 'em, eh?"

She follows the yoki, over down to a modest street of homes. It feels quite empty and devoid of people with the liveliness from before, save for a young couple who kiss their lips so tenderly by the side. The sun makes a brief shine of light through the grey clouds before being covered in obscurity once more.

The yoki seems to lead over to the entrance of one of these homes..

Clare waits. She just stares hard at the closed, wooden entrance. Nothing happens for the longest time, and no one comes out.

Welling up enough courage inside her, Clare makes a decision, and starts to the door.

_Its eclipsing shadow falled on the meek looking man inside the house, who had his head perked through the crack of the door. It would like to come into his parlour and have a good rest._

"_Can I come in?"_

"_Who are you?" he asked._

"_I like your house. Can I come in?" _

"_What the hell is this?" the man said. "No, you can't come in."_

"_Are you sure?" It raised a hand from the sack it carried to push the door all the way open._

"_What.. what are you doing?!" the man asked, trying to use all his strength to keep the door from opening. The door opens slowly anyway_..

_**it hurts**_

Clare stands, frozen still as her hand lays on the cold iron handle of the door. The scars left on her body tingle and ache as she tries to will herself to open the door against hesitation. Humid sweat goes down her forehead and cheeks.

Then her moist hand slowly and surely turns and twists the handle, and she opens the door with narily a sound.

With halting steps, Clare enters the household.


	12. Chapter 12

**SCENE 12 – **Homecoming

The first thing about this household that greets Clare is the lingering smell of sour stale rot. As the greyness inside shows itself to the pouring light through the door, she makes out the unkempt and tattered state of the house.

Overturned furniture and a very large pile of scattered cloth litter the parlour. There's one archway into the front hall – and another leading to a dining alcove and through there the kitchen.

Clare shuts the entrance door ever so slowly, leaving only the dreary grey shining through the drapes for light. For the moment, she stands in indecision, not sure what to do next in the way she is now. She just stares out from under the hood at the mess. The suppression pill seems to be wearing out – the drag of her greatsword no longer seems to pull her down with all its cumbersome weight. Still though, there's a certain lethargy that is still lingering through her self.

She tries to sense the presence of the Yoma – its yoki now the stench of a perfume overwhelmingly saturating the air. It's all too much for her to determine where it might be lurking even. But something inside tells her that it will be all right.

Very slowly, she unsheathes her greatsword (so heavy!) almost falls over in the effort, and wields it with her two hands.

Step by step, Clare makes her way into the open hall, sword wavering.

A grisly and pulverized body lies - fleshy stumps of legs propped up against the wall in the unclear darkness. Everywhere is stained by the dark red of blood spots. Now the stink hits her full on

_**it hurts**_

Her breathing comes down harder, unsettled, taking in the decayed air.

Some moaning, heard muffled through the walls.

A little pause, before Clare makes her way to where the cries come from, avoiding stepping near the body. It twitches a little as she creeps her way past it; the eyesockets, though eyeless, still seemingly eyeing her.

The mahogany door lies closed at the end of the hall – the handle dulled and worn. Clare lays her fingers on the cold cast-iron, turns it slow- it opens in a soft creak.

The chamber here is with rags and towels hanging sagged beside washbasins – the windows have all been covered up with the hanging curtains. There's an uneven dripping sound, for one of the towels, stained a bit red, leaks its spare drops into the basin. A door right in front shows hints of the outside light creaking through the cracks, while another door on the left wall..

It's the same weak moaning – right through the left door.

Clare holds her sword down as she heads over to the left – finds it hard just to pull it open-

_as it grabbed one of the bound and tied young children in its hand, and went on to the kitchen_

In the darkness of the pantry, three children, naked and bruised, lie on their side against the cold ground – their hands and feet are bound by many rags of cloth.

They whimper, as they struggle along on the ground.

_Oh shit..!_

Clare rushes on down, lays her claymore by the side, hurries her hands to untie and rip their bonds apart. The boy.. the girl... the other boy (somehow familiar). Her hands fumble. She could not help but notice their wrists and ankles are a ghastly purple.

Now these bonds are but shredded rags.

The children shake, shivering in the cold.

Clare raises a finger to her mouth - "Shh. Shhhh shh." She gives a little smile and takes off her hood to show her face. "It's okay."

And they look to her, and manage their smiles too - they are in good hands now.

"Okay," she goes, hushed. She helps them all up, and hefts the claymore from the side.

Clare inches her head out the door, looking around the laundry room to see, before she notions for them to follow. She doesn't want them to feel so cold anymore, so she rummages through the piles of cloths for anything that resembles clothing – swaddles them

and opens the back door to outside.

/

The backyard seems bare, enclosed by hedge bushes and with a withered, leafless old tree at the corner.

Clare leads them over to the tree's shelter, with the concealment of the tree trunk and hanging branches. The children huddle together, as they go to sit down and look upon Clare in her poncho.

"Stay here," she goes to them, before she heads off-

"But where are you going?" the girl asks worryingly. "Where's Mama? Papa?"

A beat.

Clare could not bring herself to say anything for a moment – the body down in the hallway brings back so much pain and horror and the sadness in her mind for her own.. _Papa.. Mama.._

The tears well down from her silver eyes, her heart under so much pain. The children do not say anything – just bewildered and frightened, that someone so brave would just cry all of the sudden.

But finally, she manages to bring herself to say something, with all sincerity. "I will find your Papa and Mama," she goes. "And I'll make sure.. that monster.. will never bother you ever again."


	13. Chapter 13

**SCENE 13 –** Black Fairy

Once more, Clare finds herself in the dreariness of the stretching hallway – the lifeless, pulverized father lying in the middle of it all. A soft wind caresses her cheeks.

She goes to checks the rooms.

Empty – a bedroom of two ruffled beds.

Empty – an enclosed storeroom of food inventory where the aroma of spices and herbs arouse her. But there's something she has to do first.

Clare comes to a bedroom; a naked woman lies limp, bound and gagged in ragged cloth atop the wide bed. The swollen bruising leaves the woman' pale skin in douses of numbed purple and aching red._ Mama.._

The stench of sweat lingers in the air.

As Clare comes closer, she notices the mother's hazel eyes staring to a distant space past her.

_No.._

Refusing to believe it, Clare raises a finger to her mouth to the mother in a silent "shh." She goes to shred the mother's bonds with all the welling rage in her own hands.

Now the bonds are in little soft tatters.

The mother does not move at all - her skin is as cold to the touch as the solemn air.

For the longest time does Clare stay by the mother's side, unwavering, before she closes the mother's empty eyes for her grace.

And Clare walks out of the room back into the hallway.

Again, the father lies there in the middle, broken.

Clare goes by the father's side – lifts him up in her arms, and brings him over to the mother lying still on the bed, in the bedroom. And once more, they are with each other's side.

She heads out back into the hallway. There's the creak of a door swinging shut somewhere. Is it the children, coming back in from curiosity? It's not safe here – it's not safe here, for they would come and see, and what they will see – there in the bedroom

is their love shattered cold.

But the creak does not come from the laundry room. It comes from the other end. The yoki in the air is overbearing now, and Clare is on the verge of a raw insanity.

She grasps her greatsword in both her determined hands, and holds herself in a striking stance – her sword angled and ready to slash apart that fucker.

She calms her breathing down to listen.

Stifled footsteps, thumbing on the ground.

Sniffing.

She steadies her footing against the ground.

Stifled footsteps, coming closer

and

closer.

A man in brown woolen clothes walks through the way to show himself on the other end. He hesitantly turns, seemingly trying to peer to the figure in darkness who just stands there. He looks familiar, for some reason.

"Who goes there?"

Clare recognizes the father's voice.

"Hello?"

Then he sees the two glints of yellow in the darkness of the hallway, and his eyes widen-

Clare **lunges**, bringing the greatsword up to its head.

The sword is in the air, and all's right with the world.

Its neck is wide open, and all's right with the world.

A relief in her, for all's right with the world.

Her sword does not meet the neck, but the blade of its longsword just short from its certain death. Then it reaches out a hand so far out to envelop her abdomen in tightening flesh.

It squeezes.

It hurts.

Where a scream of pain would follow, comes only a silent gasp out her mouth for it chokes her so. She feels her rib cage break and snap within and her own stomach contort.

The greatsword falls out of her grip.

It hurts to just breathe. Air rattles in and out of her like a saw and the black threatens to take all her sight and feeling away. Spots are dancing in the air in their own pretty patterns.

It really hurts.

With what will she has left, Clare tries to move her arms, her hands to do something of it. She claws at the eldritch flesh – the hand and arm inhumanly contorted and the purple veins bulging along the skin. Her fingernails dig under and manage to tear some of its humanly skin.

Red blood spurts out from the gashes she makes.

Then something pops inside her, and the last ounces of her breath leak away._ How do I.. stop it.._

Clare's last struggle comes to a stilted calm.

The Yoma bashes her body against the walls, and gives her a hard kick to her stomach for good measure.

A straining hunger in its stomach, after all the things to be done in the morning. There's three kids left to eat. How next will it come to enjoy them in the kitchen?

It storms down the hallway to the end, into the laundry place. Then it goes to the closed pantry door, trying to sniff more of their meaty scent. Strange. Somehow they don't smell so much. Even more strange is the lack of the frightened whimpering they give.

Awwe. Their daddy is just crying already inside. A tear streaks down from its eye. _Don't worry. You gonna be with your kids soon._

It knocks on the door. "Little pigs. Little pigs. Let me come in."

Silence.

"Not by the hair on your chinny chin-chin?"

It grasps the door handle.

"Well then. I huff. I puff. **I'll blow your house in.**"

It jerks the door open, and there are no more kids there.It blinks. No more kids. They can't have gone off like-

Shredded cloth litters the floor in the pantry. Where'd they run off to? It takes a peer around, sniffing the wondrous smells in. Now it's mad.

"Clarice! Jean! Come out!" The father's commanding voice out the Yoma's mouth. "I won't stand for this kind of malarkey in my house!"

The faint sound of leaves and branches rustling along the wind outside. Perhaps a change of voice would do better. The Yoma contorts its vocal cords in its throat.

"Nothing's going to harm you.." the mother's sweet voice goes, "not while I'm around."

Another sniff for a whiff of that delicacy in the air, and it turns to the door beside where the outside light creaks in on the edges.

Then it lays a hand on the door – twists the handle and pushes the way open to see the outside sun now shining on the bare backyard. An ashen tree roots firm there by the corner – its dark branches looming, swaying.

The Yoma looks over aside to the other neighbouring dwellings – the backyards are empty. Then to the front, where the alleyway is and no one would dare to traverse there in such the time.

The ashen tree. Its eyes waver and loom there at its thick, wrinkled trunk. It sniffs. Despite the fresh and wavering air, the scent is very concentrated there.

_Yes._

It can only imagine so much at this point, how it would best enjoy them for keeping its stomach so empty for so long. Shall it take all the children in a hungry rush – all in a thrash of bites? Or savour all their taste in its mouth, piece by piece.

But really, there is no time. It must hurry along to find them, quick. The Claymore will be quick to catch on now that it let that woman have it. It feels this longsword on the verge of shattering into shards with two, three or four hard strikes or parries. Such a fine sword for a fine Vizier at this too. Shame.

Slowly the predator shuffles itself along the grass, to the tree.

It could imagine them so vividly, that compelling combination of sourness, bitterness and sweetness on its lips - especially the juicy livers with some fava beans and a nice chianti. The whimpers of the wind, still blowing ever on, only masks their whimpers behind the trunk. There's some distant chattering of the people.

The Yoma swings around, and there is nothing there but the wrinkled wood that still bears their scent.

Something inside says to reach out for the sword now. So it does, and it can see from the blur of movement the claymore that dares to thrust, down from the grey skies. And it just swipes away the incoming claymore to send the would-be warrior to a hard tumble against the brushing grasses.

Her smooth platinum hair lays out in a mess and the claymore by her side.

The Yoma hauls the longsword in the air down to the woman's belly- she rolls herself out the way and dives for her claymore-

It bashes the side of her head with the blade's flat. The longsword wobbles left and right. A red spot spreads out her skull, dabbing down her platinum hair.

Looking at the fine gilded blade, little cracks showing close to the hilt, it decides that the longsword has enough. The last thing the longsword does as a weapon before shattering in two is severing the Claymore's calves.

The hunger is all very much now, the burning inside like acid for it does have nothing inside its own belly. It considers the pitiful thing who could only wince weakly here and there. But to taste the likes of her is to taste its own self. How disgusting.

Then the Yoma hears the murmurs of a gathering crowd somewhere around. Its stomach squeals in delight – a low rumbling inside.

/...

"What's happening over there?" and every variant of this question comes out the mouths of the gathering villagers. This it hears very well and it is in the uncertain ambiguity that it may come to shine its brightest.

It takes its steps -

past the empty pantry,

past the man and woman reunited in the bedroom,

past Clare.

The Yoma twists the handle of the door to outside, pushes it open, and sees the many onlooking faces of people who stand so warily, away enough from this house to keep from their fears, yet close enough to satisfy their curiosities.

And all of these eyes stare on.

It stumbles over like its seen wonders - ragged steps that barely hold their grasp on the dirt. The people shuffle back as it goes, making a path of space.

"Luc!"

A memory arouses inside; that is its name, this man's name. It looks around with unfocused eyes, trying find who's calling.

A woman (Alessa, her name is) rushes out from amongst the crowd._ This guy's sister. _All the tension has her soft face curled in

"Luc..!" Alessa goes. She clasps her arms around it in a tight hug.

"I'm fine.. is all right now."

Inside, its fragmentary recollection of memories tells it that in times of trouble, Alessa would be the first the children would look to. The kids don't seem to be anywhere nearby.

"Where's.. my Clarice? Where's Jean?" it goes. "Are they safe with you?"

Alessa lets go.

"They're.." A look of hesitation on her – she's noticing something. "You all right? What happened there?"

A beat.

"I'm.. I.. that woman just.. she's fighting that horrid beast.. saved me and my children."

A beat – she stares on in a bit of disbelief.

"The kids, your kids and their friend, they were running–" Her eyes waver- "running over before that Claymore came.. dear, they're so frightened.."

"Where's my children?" it goes.

The crowding people, overwhelmed, decides to send in the cavalry for some support. Armoured spearmen slowly go to approach the home's entrance – spears ready to jab.

"Alessa. I gotta see if Clarice, Jean an' the other boy are all right, now where are they?"

She looks on the mixture of staining purple and red blood on it. "They're waiting- wait, what's the matter?"

Its face is a sort of madness, on the verge of losing it to the hunger and the inner screams of all the memories it took. The Yoma tries to hold it down, or at least pass it off as a sign of great distress. "I'm sorry. I just want to be sure my little darlings are well." It lets out some tears from its eyes.

"Okay." Alessa notions to follow her.

"No," it goes. "I don't.. I just."

"I'll get them for you then," Alessa goes. "Don't you worry." A peck on its cheek before she heads on off.

The Yoma lets out a half smile in her wake as it watches on the hectic.

A young boy closeby has his head bowed low in a sort of prayer, and his mother joins him too. Others stare at the spectacle, unable to frame or put it into any proportion. It watches on, satisfied.

Gurgle.

Eventually, Alessa comes – the young Clarice, Jean and Roelof pacing along behind.

"Papa?" Clarice goes.

It looks upon them with the same sentimentality to its eyes as when they were born, raised and loved, through and through the lives they had. All these memories flash by through its mind – the memories of their parents inside saying their last goodbyes.

"Papa!" Clarice rushes along past Alessa – Jean follows her so.

The soldiers emerge from the blackness of the house. "She's hurt! Someone get us a healer – the Claymore's hurt!"

Clarice's joyful run comes to a halting slow as she begins to notice the purple splattered all over it, and the horrid, twisted grimaces of its face as its eyes show flickers of the monstrous yellow.

The Yoma just snaps, and the handsome, respectable 'Luc' tears out of the clothing – turning back to the grotesque form of its original self. It is a sort of madness, this is, as it goes to up Clarice in its arms by its chest.

Screams from the crowd, from Clarice, Jean and Alessa, serve only to feed its excitement.

Its other arm extends out, enveloping the standing Jean in the grasp.

Watching all of this, the hapless Roelof tries to run, as fast away from the nightmarish monster as his little legs can.

Pruned skin splits open on the Yoma's back – a mass of raw, tender flesh vaguely resembling a hand shoots over to the running Roelof, enveloping him also, and drags him back against the ground as the ever-scabbing flesh retracts back into its back.

"No!"

/

Clare's mind hovers in an endless abyss.

No light. No sound. No feeling.

Only an infinite and silent void.

Softness.

Weightlessness.

Through the emptiness of space, Clare tries to peer and make something, anything out. There is nothing.

_You cannot rest yet, Clare._

She stirs.

_Wake up, Clare. _

_**why? **_

Memories come and flash through her mind – all too fast to be comprehensible, too overwhelmingly fast. But there is this one common feeling, she can feel, they all share

_hope_

Then the memories are gone, and in their wake, a trail of red swirling.

Suddenly, the pain erupts.

In the lonely, abandoned depths of the hallway, her heart still beats on. But she is weak, so weak, and there is no reason to even try now. Her breathing is so shallow in her crippled lungs, she is almost motionless. The ripped grey poncho covers her, a blanket for the final sleep.

Screaming, those screaming outside, and the inhuman screeches of the Yoma.

The crippled Clare finds a last reservoir of strength, and tries to rise up. She falls over. Her breaths painfully come in and out her crushed lungs, as whimpers. She tries again, this time helping herself to the adjacent wall, and manages a pathetic kneeling.

Clare reaches for the claymore, and leans against it as a crutch, bringing herself to a stand. She limps, jabbing the claymore every step or so on the floor, her joints shaking from exertion. It is a strain, seeing, as the darkness looms always at the edges of her vision – nothing around feels real but a nightmarish experience.

She falls, hard – the light of the outside is just within her reach. Spots dance now in the ether of her eyes. As she lies, her lungs and heart on the verge of exploding, an eerie resignation comes over her mind, and feelings of eternal peace..

Clare fights.

Opening her mouth wide and tipping back her head, Clare manages the deepest breaths she could manage – each breath burning less than the last.

Everything is clear.

Clare finds her way to the light, and she steps into the outside. A line of soldiers strategically positioned surrounding the Yoma, spears pointed to Clare, confused. People huddled by each other, looking in disbelief.

"Get away from them you **bitch!**" Clare goes, readying her claymore with a shaking grasp.

"..is that you? **Clare? **Is it?" the Yoma goes, fondly remembering her memories as it clutches the shielding children uncomfortably tighter. "What are you going to do about it?"

A finger shoots out the forearm holding young Jean in front, snakes around his throat and bends his neck past its natural limit.

Clarice cries.

Lying helpless by the side, Alessa could only watch on – her fleshy stumps of forearms bleeding out red.

"No.." Clare goes. "Don't.." She feels herself drowning, a waterfall roaring inside her ears. Her heart is madly pumping amounts of blood at a rate far beyond the human norm, and she stands in a paralysed hesitation.

"Why?" It laughs. "You have nothing. Nothing to threaten me with. Nothing to do, with all your strength."

"**DIE!**" One of the soldiers just snap, unable to take it any more. He comes in a rush, thrusting the entire length of his spear against it-

The Yoma shoves Jean's body against the soldier's blow – spear shoving through Jean's stomach – and pushes the soldier flying outward, caveening to the rock wall of a house, and crashes down to the dusty ground along with the rocky debris.

The spear still juts out from Jean.

The other soldiers look into the Yoma's face, every inch of its malice. It is far beyond what they can manage, far beyond any hint of humanity whatsoever. Their spears lose the firm steadiness of duty, and they begin to shake.

"Please.." Alessa groans, on the verge of losing it. "Don't punish the children. Punish me.."

Looking down to the dying woman, it bares all its glistening teeth in a grin. "I am." Its finger snakes around, in the midst of a decision. Then it goes to poor Roelof, who hangs on from its back.

"_I'm.. I.. I.. bad.. dreams.."_

_It's okay to be afraid._

The finger punctures his neck through; a fountain of red blood spurts out in spades, and the Yoma reaches out its tongue from its mouth, and goes to drink the sweet, bitter taste that pours.

Alessa winces.

Roelof's face turns to a lifeless pale.

"Sweet.. sweet.. why should I hide who I am? I am a being, of simple taste. I enjoy watching you die, and your taste, and I enjoy the hate and pain and sadness I give you sorry excuses of life, especially right now. Pathetic." It focuses on sad, tearing Clarice in its arms. "This is why I can't stop.. being a monster!"

Clare hurls herself, throwing every fibre of her being against the Yoma. So fast is she that she seems but a speck of movement, far past what the Yoma could anticipate. Her claymore embeds itself partway in its thick neck – Clare's hands clasped onto the handle far harder than ever. She jerks.

Clarice tumbles to the ground out of the Yoma's frantic grip as its own purple blood jets out from the ruptured arteries of its neck.

A supernatural anger takes over Clare. She yanks back hard, putting the Yoma off balance and carving in more of its flesh. Its legs push back violently, buckling in.

The Yoma becomes frantic – it tries growing out arms to stop her, clutch on her, each arm more vague and tenderly raw than the last.

Clare never lets go. She pulls the Yoma back onto its heels – forces the sword through. All of its tremendous weight is hanging on her greatsword now, and she just keeps pushing.

Finally, the Yoma's body goes completely limp.

Her own self is all on its excruciating limit, about to explode, implode, whichever way her body feels to collapse.

Clare approaches the stunned Clarice with a frenzied fever, goes to hold her in her arms. "It's all right now. I gonna.. Come on.. look at your face, is all dirty with the blood – I'm gonna, take to see your mama, your papa-"


End file.
